Red Zone of Sokolov

      Here are the main points highlighted by the deputies when discussing the "unsatisfactory results."

      National Project "Education"

      In November 2024, a meeting of the federal headquarters for monitoring the progress of capital repair and construction programs for educational institutions took place. At that time, the Kirov region was classified as a "red zone" with five unfinished projects. In the spring of 2025, we reported that the actual number of problems with schools was not five, but more.

      At the press conference, the issue of project implementation was raised by Bikaluk and Mamaev. They claimed that due to unscrupulous handling beyond the 9 billion rubles allocated from the federal budget for the national project, we "added" another 9 billion rubles from the regional budget. And this is despite the fact that the city head describes the budget as "very tight this year."

      FCR

      "The second point, the second unsatisfactory result, in our opinion, is the activity of the Capital Repair Fund. In fact, this organization has been brought to a pre-bankruptcy state. We made a decision at the Legislative Assembly to allocate funds for the payment of interest on the loan it took. And as we all see in our houses, repairs after the 'facade painting' conducted for the 650th anniversary of Kirov are not being carried out now because there is no money for them, and especially those residents who live in the regions are suffering. That is, all the money that was accumulated, including in the regions, was also spent on the so-called repair of these facades. This, in our opinion, is also not quite a legal decision, because according to the documents presented to me, the fund must hold meetings and make decisions of the Fund Council on the distribution of these funds, but such decisions were not made there," said Albert Bikaluk at the conference.

      Problems with the Capital Repair Fund, however, are not new. As early as 2018, our publication wrote about "murky schemes" in its work. At that time, the FCR had over 3.3 billion rubles collected from residents, the staff had grown to 48 people, and the rates for capital repairs were set to break records in the Volga Federal District. At the same time, repairs were practically not carried out due to contractor failures and poor-quality project documentation.

      Years later, the situation has not changed: the FCR staff has grown to 60 people, maintenance costs have risen to 85 million rubles, and obligations for capital repairs, as of April 2026, have only been fulfilled halfway, and no auction for house repairs has taken place.

      Unjustified expenses: holidays, representations, renaming

      And here a quite reasonable question has been raised — do we really have the opportunity in the current situation, during the SVO, to spend money on 100500 events and annual anniversaries? The Sabantuy festival cost the region almost 500 million rubles, which, in turn, brought nothing. Literally. Did it somehow help in bringing closer ties with neighboring Tatarstan? No. Did it help in uplifting the people's spirit and strengthening the local authorities' positions in the eyes of the people? No. Therefore, yes, why and for what this was done remains unclear.

      This also applies to the question of renaming streets. For many residents of the city, this is still a painful and incomprehensible topic. For whom was this done, and why? What "return of historical names and perpetuation of memory"? Why wasn't Lenin Street renamed...

      And yes, budget funds were also spent on this, specifically for changing the nameplates — about 2.5 million rubles.

      Also, according to Bikaluk, we spent 260 million rubles on purchasing a representation in Moscow, which was attempted to be bought back in late 2025. There have been no official comments from the government on this topic yet, so the feasibility of this expenditure remains a matter of speculation.

      And the alert system. 227 million rubles were allocated for the operation of the alert system in 2024. Where and for what the money went — no one has said so far, citing "state secrets." However, we have already seen the consequences, unfortunately.

      And I would like to add about the unexplained expenditure item titled "Social Architecture," for which 150 million rubles were allocated in the first draft of the 2026 budget. The name of the project, the functions, and the purpose of which remain unclear to most, was first mentioned on November 13, 2025, at the public hearings of the regional budget project.

      However, already on January 16, 2026, at a meeting with journalists, the speaker of the Kirov region Legislative Assembly, Roman Beresnev, responded quite harshly to our question about the fate of this project: the deputies "plan to remove this expenditure item by February."

      The 150 million rubles allocated for "architecture" within the budget amendments were planned to be redistributed to other, more understandable items. Where exactly this money ultimately went — remains a mystery, as no explanations followed.

      Overall economic situation

      The average salary in the Kirov region is 70,000 rubles. This is one of the lowest figures in the entire Volga Federal District, where the average salary is about 77,500 rubles. Nationwide — 103,000 rubles. (Data from Bikaluk's speech.)

      But where we lead is in the level of inflation. As of June 2026, the annual inflation in the region was 6.88%. For comparison: nationwide, annual inflation accelerated to 6.02% in June. Thus, inflation in the Kirov region exceeds the national average by almost 0.9 percentage points.

      At the same time, according to Rosstat, in June, consumer prices in the country rose by 0.87% compared to May — this is five times higher than the May figure. And as of July 27, annual inflation in Russia was estimated at 5.94%. Against this backdrop, Kirov's figures look even more alarming: the region consistently ranks among the anti-leaders in price growth in the Volga Federal District.

      Who is to blame?

      All the questions raised by Bikaluk and Mamaev at the conference are the consequences of the existing imperfect management system, they believe. To say that Sokolov and his, I quote, "unprofessional" team are specifically to blame is not entirely accurate.

      In my opinion, the main problem of the regional head lies in his blatant secrecy — which the deputies also mentioned.

      No meetings with people, no comments for the media after "negative" publications regarding the managers, whereas during the work with the same Igor Vasilyev, there were no such problems with the unwillingness to comment on anything after "critical articles"...